An economy-wide coalition of UK companies and organisations has called on the country’s new Energy Minister, Kwasi Kwarteng, to support the development of new onshore wind farms in an effort to extricate the technology from its current persona non grata status so as to further boost the country’s efforts to reach net-zero emissions by 2050.
The United Kingdom must begin repowering its aging fleet of onshore wind farms if it is to generate enough low-carbon electricity to meet a looming 18% gap in the country’s total electricity demand by 2030.
Wind energy provided 14% of the European Union’s electricity last year, according to figures published Thursday by the region’s wind energy trade body, WindEurope, with 11.3 gigawatts (GW) of new capacity added, including nearly 3 GW of offshore wind.
Onshore wind employment figures plummeted by 37% between 2016 and 2017 in the United Kingdom as the government locked onshore wind projects out from competing in the energy market.
Onshore wind installations in the United Kingdom during 2018 fell to their lowest levels since 2011, according to new figures from RenewableUK, plummeting by nearly 80% due in large part to the fact the UK Government has excluded onshore wind projects from competing for government-backed contracts.
14 major renewable energy companies have penned a joint letter to the UK’s Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, Greg Clark, urging him to drop the current restrictions on onshore wind which prevent it from competing in the Government’s power auctions.
The UK wind energy industry announced this week that it has surpassed 20 gigawatts (GW) worth of generating capacity with the opening of Ørsted’s 659 megawatt (MW) Walney Extension off the coast of Cumbria.
A new YouGov poll in the UK has revealed that a clear majority of residents in the country not only support onshore wind power but actively favor an end to the Government’s effective-ban on new onshore wind power.
New figures from the UK’s Department for Business, Energy & Industrial Strategy published on Thursday showed that renewable energy accounted for 30.1% of the country’s total electricity generation in the first quarter, up 3% and boasting record wind generation that accounted for over half of total renewable energy generation.
A new report has found that onshore wind is the most cost effective and scalable low carbon technology in the UK and should be supported. Published by public policy charity Policy Exchange, the report — Powering Up: The future of onshore wind in the UK (PDF) — examined the future of onshore … [continued]
